Email Deliverability and Spam Control

We have been receiving emails from volunteers saying they our emails from CERVIS have either been getting caught by their spam filters or are not being received at all. Is there any way that we can decrease the amount of email being flagged as spam?

Answer:

There are several ways to help decrease the likelihood that an email message sent from CERVIS will be flagged as spam.

The number one factor that contributes to whether or not an email message is flagged as spam is the actual content and formatting of the message. Please use the suggestions below when creating email messages within CERVIS:

Do not include attachments with file types that are common to spam messages (i.e. .exe, .scr, .bat, .vbs, etc).

Make sure that all words are spelled correctly.

Use natural and comfortable language.

Try to avoid using words that are common to spam messages (i.e. pharmacy, drugs, free, bank transfer, etc).

Avoid putting HTML hyperlinks to sites commonly used in spam messages (i.e. snopes.com, any site with a .cn or .ru domain)

Make sure the volunteers you are sending email to, want to receive your emails. Volunteers that do not wish to receive email from you organization are more likely to report messages from you as spam through their email system "Report Message as Spam" feature which could make messages to other volunteers on the same email system (i.e. Yahoo, Gmail, MSN, etc.) be flagged as well. You can edit a volunteers email preferences from the “Update Volunteer Information” page in the “Volunteer Management Dashboard.”

Make sure that you have the correct email addresses for volunteers in your account. Volunteers often change email addresses or mistype their email address which results in incorrect information. If your CERVIS account is sending email to a large number of email addresses that are not valid, this could cause your other messages to be flagged as spam. For instructions on how to check for invalid email addresses, please reference the following support knowledge base article: Volunteer Not Receiving Email

Have your organization IT department or email service provider create (or update) an SPF record for your email domain. Please review the information in the following knowledge base article for additional information regarding how to configure SPF for your domain: Authorize email senders with SPF

If the person who is reporting that messages from CERVIS are being flagged as spam is a part of your organization and has an email address on the same domain as the email address being used by CERVIS to send emails, please reference the following knowledge base article: Organization Personnel Not Receiving Email

If you have implemented the previous options and are still having problems with messages being flagged as spam, you may have to change your "From Address" in your system configuration to the default CERVIS application email address to resolve the issue. To make this change, please reference the following support knowledge base article: Change the E-mail Address That Your Account Sends Messages From